The Choices in Life
by Birdy Point
Summary: Destiny is not a matter of chance, it is a matter of choice; it is not a thing to be waited for, it is a thing to be achieved. Some choices Stormy has made in the past, will come back to haunt her, while others might just fly right back into her life- R


Summary: **Destiny is not a matter of chance, it is a matter of choice; it is not a thing to be waited for, it is a thing to be achieved. Some choices Stormy Evens has made in the past, will come back to haunt her, while others might just fly straight back into her life.**

AN: Heya, this is a one shot so far, with the possibiliy of becoming a full story with some shiny new reveiws. It's a little more serious than i'd intended, but R&R anyways.

BP

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I dug into my shoulder bag, throwing out my jacket and a whole tonne of recites. I was standing in a dingy hallway, at the door of my shared apartment. The pealing wall paper and dirty orange-y, brown carpet out here was almost defiantly as old as I was, and the sounds of the other residence in the building sometimes scared me on nights like these. This was America's solution to over-crowding; packing fifty people in a run down, eight story house and calling it renting.

I dropped the rest of the contents out on the floor and slowly replaced them back into the canvas bag.

"Fuck," I muttered, finally remembering that I'd left my keys inside. I swung the strap of my bag over my head so that it rested evenly under my other arm and sighed in frustration. I looked around, hoping that one of my flat mates would come to my rescue. Fat chance.

I kicked the door in frustration and sat down with my back resting on the door. I was staring moodily at the door opposite, when I heard a rattle of locks and sliding of bolts from the inside. Suddenly, my world fell upside-down. I fell inside, letting out a strangled cry in the process. My head hit the floor and I saw stars dancing in front of my eyes.

"Stormy, you've shrunk."

I blinked up, dazed by the light till finally my eyes focused. Towering above me was a man with a short crew cut and a heart warming smile. Mike. I laughed and raised a hand for him to help me up.

The huge man grinned and reached down a big hand, taking mine. He pulled me to my feet, as easily as if I'd been a rag-doll. When everything was right way round and I was standing firmly on my feet, I launched at him for a hug.

"I can't believe you're back! I missed you so much!" I shouted and he gave me a strong squeeze. I stood back and we stood in the open doorway, grinning like idiots at each other for a few minutes.

Mike was a big guy. With shoulder as wide as my arm was long, and a chest so broad that you could park a small child's bicycle on it, he was one of the biggest guys I knew. He was almost two feet taller than me and with a smile that could brighten even the darkest of days; I loved this raven haired twenty seven year old like the big brother I never had.

Mike and his 'brother' Graham took me in six years ago, after living on the streets of New York for the three before that. Mike was working as a bouncer at a busy night club and Graham as a glassy at Hawk's, a young tough pub owner with a reputation on the streets equivalent to that of a saints. 'Hawk' Stevenson and his older sister Kimberley owned the Black Cougar pub in the Lower East side of New York City, which served as a steady income for the orphaned children since Hawk was seventeen.

I met Graham by accident, running away from a man whose wallet I had just stolen. Graham was eighteen, a year older than me. I really don't know what made him stop me that day, but it changed my life forever. When he did catch up to me, I punched his nose in thinking he was a cop. Some how he took a broken nose in good humor, and offered me a place to stay anyway. We'd been best friends ever since; Graham, Mike and me. Thank God for the strangeness that is the laws of social attraction.

"You dyed your hair again," Mike pondered, his smiling face not faulting. I smiled shyly at him, pushing my fringe out of my eyes. It was quite short, which is how I liked it.

"Do you like it? I was trying for dark purple, but it kinda' came out pink," I said quietly. He grinned widely and flicked the top of it with his palm playfully.

"It suits you," he laughed, walking off into the kitchenette. I grinned, turning to shut the door. I clicked the little gold chain lock and bolted the door before handing my bag on a hook beside it.

Our little apartment was small, but we all loved it as our own. It was the first real home for any of us; Graham ran away from foster care at the age of twelve, Mike left his drunken, abusive father at sixteen and the only real home I'd ever had had been destroyed by the organization that created me.

"When did your plane come in?" I said loudly, stepping from the entrance hall into the messy lounge room. Mike stepped though the open archway that lead to the kitchen, holding two Coronas.

"'Bout seven," he murmured, handing me a bottle before plonking himself down on our old, grey beaten up sofa. I rolled my eyes and walked into the kitchen.

"Should've called me. I could have come and picked you up," I called out, pulling open the fridge door. I took out a small tub of yogurt and put it on the bench next to the small stove. I looked around for a spoon and found a board with a browning banana peal on it instead. I sighed and threw it at the over flowing bin.

Living with wild animals, I assume is hard. Living with Graham is worse.

I walked back out with my French vanilla yogurt and a clean spoon in hand. Mike grinned at me, his feet perched on the old coffee table lined with magazines.

"Knowing you, Stormy, there'd be about fifty people waiting here to surprise me, God knows this place is cramped enough as is. _And_, I hate surprises," he stated, taking a sip of his beer and nodding at me as if to say 'so there'. I smirked.

"Naturally, I wouldn't have cared and thrown you one anyway. We would have had people jumping out of the windows by now," I agreed, switching on the television (the newest thing in the room) and sitting on the lounge next to him.

"So true. And you would have been drunk off two shots of vodka and be passed out in the arms of the poor guy who was unfortunate enough to be near you. Probably Graham," he coughed, downing half his beer. I snorted, partly because I knew he spoke the truth; I wasn't a good drinker.

"Oh sure! And you would be sitting in the kitchen with the garbage bin on your head, insisting on telling the world that you and Chicken Little were going to the moon on Tuesday," I said seriously, but grinning all the same. He glanced at me, a small embarrassed smile playing on his lips.

"That only happened once," he murmured, changing the subject, "And at my age, I could've had a heart attack and died from all this surprise," he joked, staring at the screen.

"The ripe ol' age of twenty seven," I muttered loudly as if I were one of those old men at the Black Cougar, recalling the death of a mate to another.

We laughed at each other and sat silent for I while, watching the TV and drinking out beers. It hardly felt like it'd been two years since I'd seen him last. Years ago, Mike had gone looking for something more than his life in New York. He found it in the form of the US Armed Forces and soon after training, he was shipped off to another country, to fight a war America shouldn't have been a part of in the first place.

I didn't like war or conflict. Maybe there was a time in my life when I'd lived in it, but those years are long gone now. I spent so much time in the here and now, that I blocked out the past. I erased it.

Mike looked at me and smiled tiredly. He rose and took my empty bottle in his hand and made his way to the kitchen.

"I'm gonna' have another one before I go to bed. You want one?" he muttered as he walked passed. I smiled, feeling warm and relaxed from the alcohol.

"Sure, why not," I said, turning up the volume on the TV. As I stared at the screen, a late night appeal ad came on. My heart sunk; I knew this ad. The handsome man with a long black pony tail, and sad, black, mysterious eyes stared at me from the screen. I took the remote and turned it right down, listening to Mike clinking the bottles in the fridge.

I turned it back up just at the end of the ad, just catching the last words of the gruff voice.

"Max, if you are out there, if you _are_ still alive- please, come home…" A flash of one of the only pictures of the infamous Maximum Ride flashed on screen. Behind me I heard heavy foot steps which stopped just behind me.

"Stormy," Mike murmured. I looked up at the towering man and without saying a word, he passed me the bottle. He smiled at me, but his eyes were serious. He sat down carefully next to me and patted my back.

"You did the right thing, Max. You did it for your family," he said in his deep, serious way. I stared at him for the longest time, before turning away to look at my beer.

"Yeah. Maybe."

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_AN: Stormy is Max. If this thing gets okay reveiws you'll see why she left the Flock and is living as a NY bartender, and why Fang is on TV._


End file.
